Going Inside
by gorekind
Summary: { "I m-missed you so much." The sobbed sentence is the straw that breaks the camel's back, the one that pushes Ace in deeper. Its a wave over him, heavier than anything, pulling him away from shore. Its a world whirled sensation, and Ace can't quite grasp how he was feeling before. } A series of reincarnation/past life trauma drabbles/fics. Ch. 1: Luffy/Ace, hurt/comfort.


reincarnation + past life trauma is a favorite trope of mine, and that's what this is about. this series will be disjointed one shots and drabbles in the same universe, though not all will necessarily be about past life trauma! requests will be taken at my tumblr; a link is in my profile.

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><p>Luffy's memory of the past hour is thick, sludgy. Hard for him to sift through and find the source of it all; <em>hard to think<em>._ Hard to think_. Zoro and Nami are whispering, but he can't hear what they're saying - the shape of their words is lost on him, and all he can make out is the concerned, slightly-panicked tone.

All of it just smacks flat against the glass wall surrounding him and slides down. The shadowed, unheard words become cacophonous.

He's touching thumb to all of his fingertips in a back and forth sequence - index middle ring pinky ring middle index. Back again. Just as his memory is muddled, so is his visual scope. _Can't think, can't hear, can't see - focus, focus_.

Luffy stops his grounding and bites his hand, hard; somewhere, some dark and ancient part of him tells him there's not enough give to his flesh.

"_Luffy_!"

A word sticks out, stark-bright and true amid the sludge.

_Rubber_.

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><p>Luffy's nose and hand have stopped their bleeding.<p>

The former, from the fight which preceded directly the blacking out; the latter, from his own teeth. The adrenaline has long since evaporated, but the feelings thought dead and foregone are still pumping through his veins, pulsing at the forefront of his mind.

"I'll handle it. I'll tell him to text you, okay? … Yes, all of you."

Its Ace's voice, from the front door. Luffy's grip tightens around his own wrist, pulling and encircling.

His arm does not stretch.

It never has.

"Bye, guys. Thank you very much."

Luffy looks up towards his brother, not looking bothered or zoned out in the least. The older shifts his weight over one hip, biting at his thumbnail absently. Appraising Luffy with that elder-brother-slash-caretaker look; raised brows with just a touch of expectation in his features.

Maybe he's waiting for him to say something.

They lock eyes for something close to a minute. Searching.

"Luffy." he says, quietly. Almost inaudible.

Its then that Luffy's face drops, eyes glazed over. Like he's remembered something awful; and he has. His eyes focus again in an instant, running a quick course over Ace.

He stares at Ace's midsection, a little too long, and Ace can feel his gaze burning through. It hurts. Burns hot. It always has, at random times, but Luffy's gaze seems to bring it all back again.

He sucks in a deep breath, slow and shaking, and curses at himself for being pulled under Luffy's spell. Under those strange nightmares and visions that feel like memories. He lowers himself to the floor.

"Come here." Ace tells him, holds his arms out. He'd recognize that look a hundred miles away. The tears build up at the corners of Luffy's eyes and the urge to tell him to stop dreaming dies quickly in his throat, a snuffed candle. He just needs to be reassured.

Luffy all but tackles him, arms wrapped tightly around Ace's middle.

"You're okay? Ace?"

"I'm fine, Luffy."

"Not gonna die?" the edges of hysteria touch his voice, fisting into Ace's shirt.

"Nope. I'm fine, I promise." he mutters it into Luffy's hair, letting him cry. He feels half in, half out, merely on the precipice of what his little brother seems so deeply encapsulated by. Only has his toes dipped in, where Luffy is drowning in the deep end.

He's always been an all in kind of kid.

"I m-missed you so much."

The sobbed sentence is the straw that breaks the camel's back, the one that pushes Ace in deeper. Its a wave over him, heavier than anything, pulling him away from shore. Its a world whirled sensation, and Ace can't quite grasp how he was feeling before.

Doesn't remember anything but.

What Luffy says makes _sense_, and it _shouldn't_. This fact hardly registers.

"I missed you too," he tells him, clinging tighter. He clings as if Luffy is his lifeline, and Luffy holds on in turn.

"Don't leave me again."

For these few minutes, they're neither students nor captains, neither here nor there; they're brothers, stumbling blind through memories they can't begin to make sense of. Together, liminal.

"I won't."

Luffy aligns his breathing with Ace's and they fall in and out of rhythm.

It came over them quick and hard, but the feeling ebbs away slowly. Minutes pass, the sun sets.

Its when the door opens and Ace separates himself from his brother that the grin returns, though through tears.

"_Sabo!_"


End file.
